


he could not break surface tension (he looked in the wrong place for redemption)

by transgirluma (gayapplewhite)



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Familial Relationships on the Isle Kill Me Just FYI, Gen, I Spent 20 Minutes Researching Plants For This Fic, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Italics, Lowercase
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-18
Updated: 2017-08-18
Packaged: 2018-12-17 02:53:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11842461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gayapplewhite/pseuds/transgirluma
Summary: “it tastes bitter, but sweet at the same time, and if there is ever anything that can describe his grandmother, it is that. sweet, but only when she likes you. bitter, but only when you displease her. and anthony has never done much to please her.”or; anthony tremaine, and his family.





	he could not break surface tension (he looked in the wrong place for redemption)

**Author's Note:**

> no one else was writing anthony and dizzy together and so. here we are. i had to. i wish there were more named tremaine kids [side-eyes @ melissa de la cruz] but i actually really like how this fic turned out. it's not my usual cocky, overconfident characterization of anthony, but i'd say that is more of a front he puts on, and this is more of who he really is. in into the woods cinderella's mother's grave is under a willow tree, and yes, i gave anastasia a willow partly for that reason. also, i actually never got that attached to dizzy and wrote this fic trying to like. make me more attached to her and expand her characterization beyond the-isle-kid-for-evie's-development, but this fic ended up being more about anthony. shit. i'll add more tremaine kids if we ever get them. 
> 
> the title comes from the hoosier's “a sadness runs through him”. as always, please kudos and comment if you enjoyed!

_**{i. or; yarrow}** _

yarrow is the devil's nettle. it is best used for staunching blood flow from wounds. it tastes bitter, but sweet at the same time, and if there is ever anything that can describe his grandmother, it is that. sweet, but only when she likes you. bitter, but only when you displease her. and anthony has never done much to please her. being the child of her second-favorite daughter (he'd say her least favorite, but look what _cinderella_ did to her) earning her favor has never been easy. and add to it that anthony has never been the type to lay down and do her bidding, at least not for himself, and anthony has never been her favorite. he still carries a limp on his right leg from one time she'd followed through on her threats to snip off his heels or toes from not listening to her. it was either her or dizzy, he'd reasoned, and despite the limp at the time he'd thought it was worth it. even on days when the limp slows him more than he'd like, he still thinks it's worth it.

_**{ii. or; goldenrod}** _

goldenrod is a golden flower, yellow and bright. it is best used to stave off inflammation from infections. it looks harmless, but the leaves have sharp teeth, and his aunt is nothing if not danger in a harmless form. she's ugly, inside and out, and she's spoiled and greedy, forcing her daughter to work for her mother so she won't have to. she's the reason dizzy shows up to work, bruises painting her skin the same way paint splatters her dress. she's the reason dizzy shows up at anthony's house at all hours, crying and alone. she's the reason dizzy can never believe in herself, the reason dizzy's arms are pock-marked with fingernail shaped bruises and the voice that whispers cruel things to her at night. it is because of all of that that anthony thinks he hates her, hates her more than his pampered cousin and more than his grandmother and more than he's ever hated anyone else. dizzy deserves so much better than her monster for a mother, the woman-with-sharp-teeth-and-sharp-claws who has crawled her way into the darkest part of dizzy's soul and will never find her way out.

_**{iii. or; willow}** _

willow bark is used for fever and aches, and provides a release from pain. but though they ease pain, willows are always weeping, much like his mother. he has always pitied her. she is sad, sadder than anyone else he's ever met. her husband and anthony's father died two years after anthony's birth, in a fight trying to protect his wife and son. there are still thin, flat strips of brown across his mother's face where they'd gone after her next. much like the bark of a willow. she'd tried so hard to protect him, even after his grandmother snipped off part of his heel. she'd confronted her mother about it, screamed at her when she'd hurt anthony (the one thing she had left) and lady tremaine had remained quiet, asked if she was done, and hit her across the face. it was the last time she'd ever tried to stand up to her mother, but anthony knew if it ever happened again, she'd do the same thing.

_**{iv. or; elderberry}** _

elderberry is used to heal pain from traumatic injuries, and to soothe the aches of old age. it can poison; gives protection from witches. it heals and it hurts. and just like elderberry has many sides (it heals and it hurts, is life and death on a double-edged coin) anthony has many sides. he plays at being cocky, over-confident, flirtatious, careless. he is no such thing, deep down. he says the medicine is his mother's doing (it is his. his mother is too beaten and tired to do such a thing) because on the isle, caring is weakness. and anthony _cares_ , though he does not show it. he wears a branch from an elderberry tree on a necklace under his shirt, just in case. and he may not be a witch, and may not be able to heal traumatic injuries, but he does heal, he uses plants and herbs and poultices and teas to try and help. he's like his mother, he can't stand seeing people in pain. and anthony know his mother would save them all if she could, but she cannot even save her own son from her own mother, and so she doesn't try, downs her sorrows in rotting wine and liquor. anthony is still young, still hopeful and careful and so he tries, so he tries to heal those on the isle who he can help. he gives bandages and poultices to evie when she comes around weekly, delivers herbs and teas to uma when she comes around, leaves out bandages and herbs outside of freddie's father's shop in case she and cj stumble home late and drunk and wounded. his own hands are cracked and bloody from doing dizzy's chores until his hands bled, to try and save her. and he isn't his mother — he knows, deep in his heart, that he cannot save everyone. but that doesn't mean that he can't try.

_**{v. or; dandelion}** _

dandelion is used to treat infections, for bile problems, and for improving digestion. it is incredibly hardy, growing up yellow and bright even in places that it shouldn't, and if theodora tremaine is anything, she is resilient. growing up with her mother on the isle and still she is bright, trying and dreaming and wishing and designing and anthony knows more than anything that she belongs in auradon, right next to their pampered prince of a cousin they see on the faded television in their grandmother's salon sometimes. anthony does not belong there, he knows, not with his limp and his cracked and bloody hands and the branch around his neck. witchcraft and magic are not allowed in auradon, no more than they're allowed on the isle, and anthony knows he does not belong there. but dizzy — bright, beautiful dizzy, a flower blooming among rot and trash, dizzy? she belongs there more than anyone else anthony has ever known.


End file.
